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Save the Green Planet
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Movie Info

The genre-bending black comedy sci-fi thriller Save the Green Planet! marks the feature debut of writer/director Jang Jun-hwan. Shin Ha-kyun of Joint Security Area stars as Byun-gu, an eccentric beekeeper who, with the help of his tightrope walker girlfriend, Sooni (Hwang Jeong-min), kidnaps a powerful and successful businessman, Man-sik (Baek Yun-shik). Byun-gu believes that Man-sik is an alien from the planet Andromeda, one of many hiding among us and plotting to destroy the Earth in a few days. Amphetamine-popping Byun-gu sees himself as the planet's last hope, and sets about torturing Man-sik with relish, trying to convince him to contact the "Royal Prince" and call off Armageddon. A battle of wits and wills ensues, with Man-sik trying to convince his captors that he's human and attempting to escape. Man-sik recognizes Byun-gu as a disgruntled former employee whose comatose mother suffers from a mysterious illness. It begins to seem that Byun-gu's true motivation may be personal, but he's still ruthlessly determined to get Man-sik to confess and cooperate, even if he has to risk killing him. Meanwhile, a disheveled detective, Chu (Lee Jae-yong), and his young acolyte, Inspector Kim (Lee Ju-hyeon), discover that the person who kidnapped Man-sik may have struck several times before, always with deadly results. The distinctly offbeat Save the Green Planet! was a box-office flop in South Korea, but it won some acclaim on the festival circuit. The film had its U.S. premiere at the 2004 New York Korean Film Festival.

Audience Reviews for Save the Green Planet

Bizarrely impressive, Save The Green Planet! is an obtrusive South Korean hybrid of ridiculous mystery, grotesque suspense, odd romance, eccentric science fiction, and dark humor that follows the dangerous obsession of a man with the extraterrestrial. Save The Green Planet! may be corrupt, but the inventive original idea is preposterously remarkable that frankly created a new genre, which Save The Green Planet! selfishly occupy. Organized chaos.

Jan Marc Macababayao

Super Reviewer

What a delight, A multi-genre film that successfully twists your emotions & thoughts, Not just some random images and actually an Impressive & thought-provoking experience

Arash Xak

Super Reviewer

½

Save the Green Planet is a film that refuses to be defined by a single genre and goes against what you may have come to expect from cinema. It's true originality packaged in comfortable surroundings. The story may sound like a comedy but this is hard hitting, thought provoking and at times, difficult to watch. The film keeps us guessing as to whether the aliens exist, it's all the ravings of a madman, or maybe a bit of both. It deals with human nature in a frank and unsettling way. We are given a protagonist that we gradually become more and more distant from. The comedy is very dark but not so much that it isolates the viewer. One scene has a character shoot at a swarm of bees in a sad attempt stop them from attacking. The film laughs at this action by showing a couple of bees fall to the ground dead. This one moment sums up one of the main points of postponing the inevitable. To say what the film is truly about is to give away the ending. A film that demands another watch.

Luke Baldock

Super Reviewer

½

A disgruntled ex-factory worker kidnaps the CEO of his former employer, convinced that he is an evil alien out to destroy the world in one week's time. But then again, he could just be a delusional lunatic...This complete fruitloop of a film is unlike anything else you are going to see. For most of the film it's like a semi-comic version of Misery as Byung-gu sadistically tortures the man while a similarly oddball cop who's been demoted to kitchen duty tries to track him down. Then as a ploy to escape, his victim concocts a Usual Suspects style history of the planet consisting of every pop culture sci-fi story combined with pre-history, myth and religion. And then it just gets WEIRD! Starting off as a cross between Seven and Misery and ending up like The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy, this has got to be one of the best sci-fi-comedy-horror-serial killer movies I've seen....Totally hatstand.